⑫SASAKI Rui Subtle Intimacy / Utsuroi 2024

This is a work in which collected plants are inserted between glass plates and fired to conf ine them. The plants were col lected each month in the neighborhoods where Sasaki worked, including her studio, home, parents’home, and residency sites, so the species of grasses and their growing environment vary, as do the size and number of bubbles that appear in the glass. The concept of the work is, while paying attention through production to the nature and climate around her, to explore the “faint nostalgia” felt in the place where she existed, using glass, a material that can be preserved for many years. Sasaki says that her production has been greatly affected by varying growth conditions and types of plants after the COVID-19 pandemic, and by changes in raw materials and quality of glass due to the wars and other factors. During the production of this work, the artist immersed herself in researching the names of plants and was surprised to learn that most of the plants she had remembered with nostalgia were in fact naturalized ones. This experience gave Sasaki a new perspective on the notion of memory and nostalgia.